Have I?" said Steve, his eyes brightening. "I am especially glad you
think I have used my time well, because I can never forget that it was
you who taught me my letters,--even how to spell my name," and he
turned kindling eyes upon her.

"Did I?" she said, laughing and flushing.

"Yes," he returned, and a bit of tenderness crept into his voice. "I
will never forget how you did it, how picturesquely you characterized
the various letters for me, how you thought curly S the very prettiest
letter in the alphabet, and how disappointed I was when I found my
poor name did not hold a single letter which belonged to yours," and
there was such deep pathos in the last words, as he looked far into
the distance, that she stirred uneasily and could make no answer.

After a moment he went on: "I suppose I read in it, even then, a
prophecy of our future, how yours must be separate from mine. There
could be nothing in common."

And still she was dumb; not a word came to her lips. But he seemed to
need no reply; a sad meditativeness was stealing upon him which made
him oblivious for the moment of his surroundings.

But suddenly setting his lips firmly, he turned and said with forced
lightness:

"What a bear bachelorhood makes of a man! I have spent so much time
alone the last few years that I am already acquiring the bad habit of
thinking my thoughts aloud sometimes. Forgive me, won't you?" And he
turned to her with more in the tone than the simple words could
convey.

"I have nothing to forgive," said she, but with an effort,--which he
misinterpreted.

Then gathering her wits she repeated, "I have nothing to forgive, but
everything for which to thank you. My starting you in the life
intellectual cannot compare with your finding me hanging by a mere
thread from a tall tree top and restoring me to the life physical,
without which my brilliant intellectual attainments would have been as
nothing," she ended gaily, breaking the tension which both had felt.

The talk continued to drift near the sacred realm of the heart,
however, until the sanctity of engagement was finally touched upon.

"An engagement is to me a very sacred thing," said Nancy with sweet
seriousness, in response to something from Steve. "I have never
understood how it could be lightly entered into with only the basis of
a brief, gay acquaintance."

Was not that just what she had done? "Oh, consistency, thy name is
certainly not woman," thought Steve bitterly. H